~ snails in art

(239) BNF Ms. Français 331

Of this copy in the Bibliothèque National in Paris no coloured illustrations are available at the moment. The title is “L’Istoire de la conqueste du noble et riche thoison d’or” and the 15th century manuscript is in French with many miniatures and borders [1].

In the upper border of f. 52v the first snail is encountered aside a bird. The shell is dextral with nearly three whorls, the animal has only two tentacles visible and no tail.

Similar snails can be found in the right-hand resp. lower border of f. 72r. One shell is light coloured and dextral, the other is darker coloured and sinistral.

On f. 86v one snail is in the left-hand border. It is a sinistral specimen.

On f. 92r in the upper right border a peacock peeks down on a snail, hidden in its (dextral) shell.

A similar scene is visisble in the upper border of f. 158v. Here the peacock doesn’t seem to notice the snail, which is out of the shell.

Finally, on the same page in the lower border, a variation on the ‘knight v. snail’ theme can be seen. The knight is a hybrid man who is partly a horse. The theme corresponds with the miniature on the page where a knight armed with a bow attacks a castle.